


It's a Kind of Magic

by no_writing_just_ideas_without_motivation



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: A LOT of Angst, Abusive Parents, Blood and Gore, Crowley thinks he's evil but actually he's just an overly dramatic prankster, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Fluff and Angst, Happy Ending, Highschool AU, Hurt Aziraphale (Good Omens), Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Protective Crowley (Good Omens), Snake Crowley (Good Omens), Snakes, So much angst, Winged Crowley, Wings, but its not too bad, im just a sucker for angst, not edited because my editor is out of town but its not TOO bad
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-13
Updated: 2019-07-28
Packaged: 2020-06-27 18:40:11
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,215
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19796746
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/no_writing_just_ideas_without_motivation/pseuds/no_writing_just_ideas_without_motivation
Summary: "Who are you?""Name's Crowley.""Are you a demon?""What else would I be, an aardvark?""Are you going to kill me?""Not really my style. I'm just going to annoy the hell out of you for as long as I can."





	1. Chapter One

**** Aziraphle  _ swears  _ the new place in the England countryside is haunted. 

They only just moved in seven days ago, and already he’d been woken up six times by the feeling of a presence in his room, seen six scratches appear on the wall, and heard six weird and completely abnormal sounds.

_ 666,  _ Aziraphale thought.  _ At least it has a sense of humor.  _

His parents kept laughing him off, but Aziraphle just  _ knew  _ the house was haunted.

At first, he’d tried to tell himself it was just the stress of the move; the weird feeling was just anxiety over a new school, the scratches were just rats, and the noises were just the settings of an old house*. Then a book fell off one of his shelves for no reason at all, and Aziraphale gave up and accepted the fact: the new house was haunted.

_ *The house was, in fact, very old; it had been around since the 16th century. _

On the eighth morning, a Monday, Aziraphale woke at 5:32 AM and dressed for school in his normal attire. He made himself a breakfast of crepes with bananas and whipped cream and put on a pot of tea for his parents when they woke for work. By that time, it was only 6:26 AM. School started at 8:50 AM. 

Aziraphale decided he might as well start the half hour walk to the school so he could be gone when his parents woke up. He stuffed his books in his old book bag and walked out the door, shutting it quietly.

He made it halfway down the drive and froze.

There was that  _ feeling  _ again. As if someone - or some _ thing _ \- was watching him from the bushes. 

“Hello?” he called. “Is someone there?”

There was not, he realized after a few minutes, someone there. 

~*~*~

Aziraphale made it to the school in 41 minutes. There was only one other person there; a small, brunette haired girl with her head bent over a book. 

Aziraphale smiled slightly* and made his way over to her. He was a bit of an introvert, but he knew he needed to make friends. His shoes crunched against the pebbled path and onto the grass, stopping next to the girl under a large tree.

_ *It was nice to know that other kids still liked books, and not just him. _

“Er, hello…” Aziraphale said. The back of his neck felt hot. “I’m Aziraphale.”

The girl glanced up at him. “Mason. Are you new?”

“Um, yes. May I… May I sit?”

She shrugged. Aziraphale realized the tips of her hair were a dark blue color. He sat down next to her, leaning up against the tree. “What are you reading, dear?”

Mason flipped up the edge of the book to show him the title-  _ Where the Red Fern Grows. _

“Ah,” Aziraphale murmured. “Sad one, that.”

“Read it before?”

“Oh yes,” he said. “One of my favorites.”

He brought out his own book and began reading.

The bell for the start of class rang what seemed like only minutes later. 

“What’s your first class?” Mason asked, putting her things in her bag and standing up. 

Aziraphale squinted at the little scrap of paper. “AP History.”

“With Anderson?”

Aziraphale nodded.

“Come on then.” 

She led him to her locker, which his just happened to be a few lockers away from his. “Hurry and put your things away, Anderson hates when people are late. Don’t  _ ever  _ be late to Anderson’s class.” 

Aziraphale nodded, putting in the code for his locker from the piece of paper with his schedule. He opened it and came face-to-face with a post-it note that had the words  _ Hi, angel _ and a smiley face written on it in red pen. 

He showed it to Mason, who only raised an eyebrow and said she didn’t know of any clubs who put sticky note in the lockers of new students*. 

_ *There were some that gave new students tours or school supplies, but none that put post-it notes in peoples’ lockers.  _

Aziraphale kept it anyway. 

~*~*~

School was uneventful. The only class he really liked was his english class, as the teacher was laid back and didn’t really care what his students did as long as they got the work done well and on time.

He was bored through most of his classes. Mason was in four out of the six he had, and she read through most of them. When she talked to the other students, it was with short words and unhidden glares and sarcasm and rolled eyes, but when she talked to Aziraphale it was with easy-going smiles and chuckles and eyes that gave him her full attention. 

Aziraphale knew she wouldn’t admit it, but she really was a nice person. 

He made his way home quickly, knowing his parents wouldn’t be home for a few hours. Maybe he would have the house to himself for a while. 

Entering the large house, he set a kettle to boil on the stove for tea. When it was done, he took a seat on the couch in the living room and picked up the book he was currently reading:  _ The Woes of a Modern Man’s Dog.  _

About half an hour into his reading, his head starts to pound. When he takes off his glasses to rub at his eyes, he sees a flash of bright yellow, snake-like eyes, burning with fire into his eyes.

_ I really must drink more water,  _ Aziraphale thinks. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two**

“Who are you doing the project for English on?” Mason asked, leaning against the locker next to his. A few feet away, a kid loitered, glancing anxiously at Mason.

“Dear, I think you’re standing in front of someone’s locker,” Aziraphale said, nodding at the boy. 

Mason glared at him until he looked away.

Aziraphale gave her a look.

She sighed and rolled her eyes, but moved to Aziraphale’s other side, an unoccupied locker. “I’m doing the archangel Gabriel.”

Aziraphale tensed. “Ah. That’s my father’s name.”

“Great. Who are you doing the project on?”

Aziraphale shrugged. “I was thinking the angel Azrael.”

“The fallen one? Angel of destruction?”

Aziraphale nodded, shutting his locker. They began their walk out of the school. “That’s the one. I thought he’d be interesting*.”

_ *Actually, he’d just saw that the angel’s name was similar to his own and thought it would be funny to do a report on him. _

Mason shouldered her bag. “Maybe.”

“At least I’m not doing the one three other people are doing,” Aziraphale said pointedly. 

“Shut up. See you tomorrow.”

Aziraphale said goodbye and hurried along the walk to his house. His father was working late today and bound to be in a bad mood. If he hadn’t done all his chores by the time Gabriel got home…

Aziraphale shuddered and quickened his pace.

~*~*~

He opened the door and froze. 

There was a man sitting in a chair in the living room, with spiked red hair and dressed in all black, reading one of Aziraphale’s books. And he had… wings?

“Er…” Aziraphale said. 

The man looked up, his eyes widened, and he vanished. 

Aziraphale told himself he needed to get more sleep. 

The next day, he came home and saw an apparition of the same man in the hallway, whistling a tune as he put a rubber duck on top of the copier. When he blinked, the man vanished, and Aziraphale passed it off as a hallucination brought on by stress from school. Aziraphale found thirteen rubber ducks in total that day, placed in strategic spots around the house.

A few days after that, Aziraphale saw the man emptying a tube of dark blue hair dye into his shampoo. He shrugged and drank some chamomile tea for stress.

His blonde hair turned dark blue. Mason said it was a very fashionable look.

He saw a number of other odd things* over the next two weeks, and resigned himself to the fact that the spirit haunting the house was a bit of a dick.

_ *Instances include: _

  * __The man blocking the sensor of Aziraphale’s computer mouse with tape and a picture of Nicholas Cage.__


  * _The man using the cheese powder from a box of macaroni and cheese in the orange juice container._


  * _The man taking the stuffing out of oreos and replacing it with mayonnaise._


  * _Aziraphale finding a grand total of 69 rubber ducks._


  * _The man gluing googly eyes to everything on Aziraphale’s desk._


  * _Aziraphale finding a black and red snake in one of the cereal boxes (he wasn’t sure where the snake came from, but he was quite certain it was the work of the spirit.)_


  * _The man yelling at the houseplants in the living room._


  * _The man just generally causing low-grade mayhem and confusion in the inhabitants of the house._



Then, one day, the inevitable happened.

Aziraphale’s father got caught in one of the pranks.

He came home after an extra long day at work and, when he tried to enter his room, a bucket of ice cold water fell on his head.

“AZIRAPHALE!” Gabriel bellowed, striking fear into the hearts of everyone in the house*.

_ *Even Crowley, though he will try to convince you otherwise. _

Aziraphale put down his book, just in time for his father to strom in, soaking wet, and grab the teen by the collar.

“I’ve had enough of your little  _ jokes, _ ” Gabriel snarled in his face, absolutely livid. He shifted his hold to the back of Aziraphale’s neck, squeezing hard, and roughly steered him out to the kitchen. “Get the stool.”

Aziraphale knew what was about to happen. 

Head bowed low in submission, he picked up the stool and placed it precisely in the center of the floor. Then, he pulled off his shirt and folded it neatly, setting it on the counter. He took a deep breath, blinking back tears, and knelt with his bare back to his father, resting his arms in a crossed position on the stool and bowing his head between them.

“Do you have anything to say for yourself?” Aziraphale heard the unbuckling of the belt and fought not to flinch. Gabriel always did this; he always asked if Aziraphale had anything to say for himself, and if Aziraphale said anything it always made everything worse. 

“No, sir,” Aziraphale whispered.

“Good.” 

The first strike fell.

~*~*~

**Crowley**

He watched curiously as Aziraphale bent over the stool, shirtless. What was going on?

“Do you have anything to say for yourself?” The man, Aziraphale’s father, asked. 

“No, sir,” Azriaphale responded, his voice barely audible. 

“Good.” 

When the first strike of the belt fell, Crowley barely saw it. He was too busy watching Aziraphale. 

The belt landed with a resounding  _ crack  _ against the teen’s back. He jerked a little but didn’t make a sound. 

Crowley’s jaw clenched. He couldn’t step in. He wasn’t aloud to. 

The belt fell again. And again. And again. Over and over and over until Aziraphale’s back was a bloody mess and he was sobbing silently into his arms. 

Crowley lost count at 18.

Crowley flinched and looked away, shutting his eyes tightly. 

This was his fault. 

~*~*~

**Aziraphale**

Aziraphale hissed slightly, dabbing at his bloody back with a damp washcloth. His hand trembled, both from pain and the strain of holding his arm in such an awkward position. 

“Ow...” he groaned. 

“Need ssssome help?”

Aziraphale jumped and looked into the mirror. The man stared back at him, with his spiked red hair, dark sunglasses, dark clothes, and pitch black wings folded behind him. 

Aziraphale turned around, staring wide-eyed at the man. “You.”

The man raised an eyebrow. “Me?”

“Who are you?”

“Name’s Crowley.”

“Are you a demon?”

“No, I’m an aardvark. Yes, I’m a demon, you idiot.”

“Are you… are you going to kill me?”

“If I wasssss going to kill you, I would have done it already,” Crowley said impatiently. “Are you going to let me help you with your back or not?”

“What? Why do you want to help me? You’re a demon!”

“Yes, a demon who caused all this. I’m not allowed to heal you, but I can help you clean it and wrap it.”

Aziraphale couldn’t help but wonder what he meant by  _ not allowed,  _ but chose to let it go. “Fine. Whatever. Just, ah, be careful.” 

_ What’s the worst that could happen, presenting his blind spot to a demon?  _

Crowley took the washcloth and gently patted at his back. “He really didn’t hold back, did he?”

“No.”

They were silent for a moment, so thick you could cut it with a knife. 

“I know you want to ask a question,” Crowley said. “Spit it out, angel.”

_ Angel?  _ “Why are you helping me?”

“This was my fault.”

“I get that, but why do you care?”

Crowley’s hand stilled for a moment, then started up again. “All clean. Do you have anything to wrap it?”

Aziraphale rolled his shoulders, wincing at the sting. “I could cut up an old undershirt. That’s what I usually do.”

Crowley’s eyebrow raised. “Usually?”

Aziraphale didn’t answer. 

Crowley sighed and suddenly there was a roll of medical tape in his hand. “Sssssit ssssstill.”

“How did you- ow! Be careful!”

“Stop moving!” Crowley shot back, quickly wrapping it and tying it off. “There. All done. Change it every few hours.”

And with that, he was gone. 


End file.
